Where did the west go?

This is a re-post of a previous article (March 27, 2006)

I’ve been looking around, metaphorically speaking that is, for the old west. Has anyone seen it? I sure haven’t; not in the last few years anyway. I’ll give you fair warning right now, don’t tell me Brokeback Mountain, because that’s a sure fire way to get sideways with me! A movie about a couple of rope smokin’ sheep herders is NOT the old west. That is a propaganda film.

That reminds me of a joke I heard a while back. St. Peter was walking around in heaven one day when he noticed John Wayne laying on the ground, passed smooth out. “John, John are you all right?” He asked him as he was slapping his face and shaking him. John finally came to and said “Yeah, yeah, Pete, I’m ok.” “Well what happened?” St. Peter asked. John told him “I just saw Brokeback Mountain!!”

Yeah, that was kind of my reaction too. But I don’t want to spend this whole article on what’s wrong with Hollywood. I want to focus on what used to be right with Hollywood, as well as the real west.

I really feel I was born about 150 years too late. I’ve had people tell me that I’m crazy. They wonder how you could do without things like TV, computers, cell phones, etc. Yeah, I use those things too, but I would give them up for the chance to saddle a horse and just ride into some wide open land I’d never seen before. You know as far as I’m concerned, the best thing about TVs, radios, and the internet is that those are the things that we modern day wanna be’s use to pretend and recreate the old west. So, why not just live in the real thing instead of trying to recreate it?

When I say pretend, you have to understand the context that I’m using. There are still plenty of Sho’ Nuff cowboys out there. It’s just that most of these men and women would also tell you they feel like they were born too late.

I don’t really know what has happened to Hollywood, other than their ultra-liberal agenda, but maybe that is the problem. Hollywood was built on westerns, ever since “The Great Train Robbery” in 1903. Throughout the 1930’s and 40’s Gene Autry and Roy Rogers were box office kings. Those two were the heavyweights but there were plenty of others like Tom Mix and William Hart and the rest of the singing cowboys like Tex Ritter, Rex Allen and others. Also after becoming a star with Stagecoach in 1939 there was a new gunslinger in town. John Wayne was riding tall in the saddle (literally and figuratively).

He is my personal favorite. I’m his namesake (Wayne is my middle name, thanks Dad!) The Duke had about a 50 year career mostly in westerns. He became the epitome of what a man should be. As far as I’m concerned that man can do no wrong.

After the Duke died in 1979, the genre damn near died with him. Tom Selleck and Sam Elliott have done their best to keep it going, but most of their movies, which are excellent, are either made for TV or strait to video. Even the two westerns I personally consider to be the best ever, Lonesome Dove and The Good Old Boys, were both made for TV.

Off the top of my head I can’t think of a western made since Open Range in 2003. We are going on three years without a good old fashioned cowboy movie. What the hell is wrong with that picture?

Enough about Hollywood, lets look at the real modern west for a minute. I live here in the Austin area and this place is growing like a weed. People are being shoe-horned in here. I know that is a sign of a strong economy and that is a good thing but I hate to see all this good country getting developed into strip malls and gated communities.

These old farmers and ranchers who have had their land for generations are starting to sell it off in sub-divided tracts for huge payoffs. I can’t say I blame them for taking the money. I just hate to see all this beautiful hill country land disappear.

Where I live here in Lockhart is a little different. It is still a rural area for the most part but so many people are moving out of Austin that they are littering the countryside. You just can’t get away from your neighbor. I like to have good neighbors as much as the next guy; I just don’t want to have to look at them all the time. When I am out in the country I want to feel like I am in the middle of nowhere.

That brings me finally to those who are keeping it alive. I do a lot of research on people and organizations that are dedicated to keeping the old west alive. You know for years I have had this fantasy of building my very own old west town, just like a movie set, except actually functional. The only thing that has stopped me from doing it is a glaring lack of funds. So if any of you old west aficionados out there have some money you would like to invest give me a call and we will make this thing a reality! Ok, I’m getting sidetracked, dammit, back to the people keeping it alive.

Once again I have to thank my dad for stoking my interest in the west. When we were growing up he was a buckskinner. That is a person who does Mountain Man reenactments. It was a lot of fun for a boy to be involved with. It was like being in a movie, except you weren’t paid! From there I got into Civil War history and, finally, cowboys. Over the last several years this has led me to become huge fans of people like Red Steagall, Don Edwards, R.W. Hampton and Jeff Gore who also happens to be a friend of my parents.

It seems like they are fighting overwhelming odds, but these men are doing all they can through music, poetry and stories to keep the cowboy alive. I have become a regular listener to Red Steagall’s Cowboy Corner on Sunday mornings as I’m driving home from work. If you want to hear stories from real westerners, not just cowboys per say, but anything dealing with the west, I highly recommend it.

Speaking of 'not just cowboys', I would like to emphasize that the “Old West” was not just about cowboys. That is just a generic term that gets thrown around for anything that happened in the 1800’s. The west was actually full of all kinds of sub-genre’s from Mississippi river boat gamblers to mountain men, pioneers, chuck wagon cooks, prospectors, civil war soldiers, the western Calvary soldiers, Indian dancers, Buffalo Soldiers, gunfighters, and yes, the cowboy, whose heyday was from 1866 to 1886 roughly.

You know if I ever did get to build my old west town, I would like to have a yearly festival out there. I’d call it Jason Watson’s Old West Fest. Anything that happened from 1800 to 1900 would be welcome. Whatever your particular reenactment or craft is you could set up out there and show it off to the public. Once again if anyone reading this has lots of money please get in contact with me.In closing I want leave you with a line of one of the most popular cowboy songs ever written that pretty much sums it up for all of us who missed out on the good old days.Round up in the spring:

In the lobby of a big hotel in New York town one day, sat a bunch of fellers tellin yarns to pass the time away. They told of places where they had been and the different things they’d seen. Some preferred Chicago town, while others New Orleans. In a corner in an old armchair sat a man whose hair was gray. He listened to them eagerly to what they had to say. They asked him where he'd like to be, his clear old voice did ring, I'd like to be in Texas for the round-up in the spring.

So until next time, happy trails, keep yer back to the wind, keep yer powder dry, and all those other great western goodbyes.

God and Texas,

Jason Watson

Frontier Texas

I've always been a history buff and a fan of museums. I like to visit places that have to do with all kinds of history. One museum in particular really stands out for me though and that in Frontier Texas in Abilene.

The reason I'm such a fan of this one is because it tells about the history in my backyard. Sometimes it is hard to relate to a subject if you've never spent any time in that area. Frontier Texas basically covers east of Brownwood to San Angelo, up through Abilene and all the way up to Ft. Richardson in Jacksboro. In the mid to late 1800's that was the end of civilization, if you went west of San Angelo or Abilene you were pretty much on your own. You might as well leave your scalps at the door.

You could almost draw a line on a map from Del Rio to Wichita Falls. Some of the main ones were Ft. Duncan, Ft. Clark, Ft. McKavett, Ft. Concho, Ft. Chadbourne, Ft. Phantom Hill, Ft. Griffin and Ft. Richardson. The farther east you went from here, the better off you were. But with us being Americans and that whole Manifest Destiny thing we just had to keep pushing west and that caused lots of heartache but it did establish the land we have today.

The Frontier Texas museum guides you through this area of Texas during that time and it introduces you to real people who lived and helped settle this area. The actor Buck Taylor is the virtual guide through the museum and it focuses on people like Cynthia Ann Parker who was captured and raised by Indians and Britt Johnson who was a former slave who was a muleskinner in the area who had to rescue his family from Comanches.

If you haven't been you should really go. Take you kids, they will love it. They will also learn that there was some pretty cool stuff happening before Hannah Montana and the Jonas Brothers ever came along! It is high tech and very interactive. It has virtual tours, holograms and all kinds of special effects and of course it has plenty of authentic artifacts from that time. Spend the money, spend an afternoon in Abilene and you will not be disappointed.

God and Texas,

Jason Watson

From Vaqueros and Charros to Cowboys and 'Punchers

This is a re-post of a previous article

Everybody thinks the cowboy is a uniquely American creation. Well that is not entirely true. Yes, it has evolved into something totally American but like just about everything else in this country it has its roots from another land.

As you all know, Mexico had Texas long before we Americans did. Before that, Spain was in control of this land. The men that had first settled this land are the ones who brought the art of working cattle and taming horses. Americans did not start to settle here until 1821. Mexico had started to allow some Americans to come in and become citizens of Mexico.

Moses Austin was supposed to bring the first settlers but he became sick and later died so his son Stephen F. Austin began bringing the settlers and settling in central and east Texas. From 1821 until after the Civil War (1861-1865) there really was no American Cowboy. The people here in Texas at that particular time were just your typical pioneers and homesteaders just like you see in the old TV westerns.

The people who settled in Texas after 1866, for the most part, were poor farmers from the South. Most of these people had their homes and farms blown to bits from the Civil War. The main thing these people did with cows was milk them. As far as horses (and mules) go, they would either ride them for transportation or hitch them to a plow or buggy.

Once these people settled out west, especially in Texas, they saw all these wild longhorn cows running loose. They knew there was a new business to be tapped in to, but they didn’t yet know how to 'Cowboy.'

Enter the Charro; he is also known more commonly as a vaquero. A vaca is Spanish for cow, so vaquero literally translates into a “worker of cows”. Charro was sort of a nickname sort of the same way we call American cowboys 'punchers or waddies. The term 'buckaroo' is also a slang term for cowboys that has its origins in us white folk's inability to properly pronounce “va- ker-ooh”.

The Charro originates from Jalisco (which is where the Mariachi can also be traced back to in the mid 1800's) and Michoacan (where my in-laws happen to hail from), Mexico. This particular area of Mexico developed the traditional “cowboying techniques” that were eventually passed on to the Americans.

The charro participates in Las Charreadas, which is basically a Mexican rodeo. It is actually the national sport of Mexico. Most people, like me, would have guessed it was soccer or baseball. Anyway, the Charros are world renowned for their horsemanship.

Charros are also known for their colorful dress, known as trajes (trah hes). These costumes are what later evolved into the traditional Mariachi costumes. Anyone that knows Mexicans as well as I do, know that most of them have a flair for the dramatic, as you can see this tradition dates back many, many years.

Personally I believe a lot of racism and hatred that some people hold against each other could be overcome just by learning about our history. The Texicans and the Mexicans have much more in common than not. They developed the Charro and gave us the Cowboy. Their Charros also developed into their version of the “singing cowboys” more specifically Mariachis. Our cowboys developed into colorful singers as well, which I described in last weeks article. They have had the Charreada and we developed the rodeo in the 1880’s.

Another little known fact about the Mexican cowboys is Los Kinenos. In the 1850’s, Richard King began buying up a lot of land in South Texas and turned it into the world famous King Ranch, which is one of the largest ranches in the world. It has over 825,000 acres, which makes it larger than the state of Rhode Island. In 1854, he traveled to a village in Mexico that had been pretty much wiped out by a drought and he hired the entire town to come to Texas and work for him on the ranch. They later became known as Los Kinenos or the king’s men. To this day the descendants of the original Kinenos are still working, living and thriving on one of the greatest ranches ever known.

So the next time your watching Lonesome Dove, or at a rodeo, or just working on your own ranch, give a tip of the old sombrero to our partners from south of the border.

God and Texas,

Jason Watson

My Cold Dead Hands

For years now, actually as long as I can remember, liberals in this country have been looking for a way to outlaw guns but that damn Constitution kept getting in the way of their best laid plans. They may have finally come up with a plan though. Although I hate what they are doing I have to admit it was a pretty foxy move.

Since the Constitution says "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." Some have tried to argue that what the amendment really means is that only state militias like your local national guard can keep weapons. Anyone with half a brain could see through that scheme though and the courts have upheld that individuals can keep their own personal weapons. For those of you who don't understand what the national guard is, I will try and explain. The guard is a reserve unit where people usually drill one weekend a month and two weeks in the summer. When they are needed, they can be called to active duty by the governor of each state for emergencies, the kicker is that they not only belong to the state but they also fall under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Army and U.S. Air Force which makes them federal organizations. We can't fight against federal oppression if we are also employees of that same federal government. I hope that makes sense, it doesn't sound like it came out right.

The entire purpose of the second amendment was to keep the feds from becoming too powerful and oppressive. If we didn't own guns the people in Washington would have no reason to fear us. They would have total control over us. Even Adolf Hitler understood this concept when he said "The most foolish mistake we could possibly make would be to allow the subject races to possess arms. History shows that all conquerors who have allowed their subject races to carry arms have prepared their own downfall by so doing." The point is it is all part of the checks and balances idea that our government was formed on.

Our founding fathers were no fools either. You have to remember they just left European countries where they were oppressed and they wanted no part of that in the brand new good old U.S.A. George Mason once said "I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials." James Madison was quoted as saying "[The Constitution preserves] the advantage of being armed which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation...(where) the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms." And finally Thomas Jefferson said "What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms."

The point is that these men got it. They understood why people should be able to keep arms as long as they are peaceful law abiding citizens. Now we are the exact people who are being targeted. What President Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid have finally figured out is that it is OK to let them keep the guns but they have no constitutional right to own ammunition. So hey, lets go after the ammo. Anyone who has been to Wal-Mart, Academy, Cabela's or any other sporting goods store lately have noticed two things. The ammunition shelves are nearly empty and whats left is priced through the roof. It is a back door gun control policy and it is wrong!

Your federal government is looking for another way to cheat you out of one of your basic rights. This is not what our government was created for. We don't need a nanny state. The basic job of the federal government is to defend us against all enemies foreign and domestic and to make treaties and trade agreements with other countries and that is about it. Anything that is not specifically spelled out in the Constitution is left up to the state's discretion.

This is just one component of the Tea Parties that have sprung up all over the country on April 15th and July 4th. The people (of both parties) feel like they are not being represented properly. The taxes and spending is the main issue but the assault on the bill of rights is also a big concern of everyone too.

I don't have a quick fix answer to this problem. The best advice I can give is to research your congressmen and senators and vote in people who share your values. If they go to D.C. and forget all about you then vote them out every two or six years. The next Congressional election is 2010. Get involved learn about the issues and candidates and you can make a difference, you can give your kids and grand kids the same country we enjoyed years ago. Also I would advise you to join organizations like the N.R.A. and the Heritage Foundation. These are organizations dedicated to defending the traditional American rule of law. I am begging all of you who read this, change the leadership in Washington. Fall is coming up soon and I want to go hunting!

God and Texas,

Jason Watson